Scout Motors is one of the most hyped car brands of the decade. Volkswagen, Scout’s parent brand, bought the rights to the nameplate in 2020, revived the automaker in 2022 after 40 years of neglect, and made a huge splash in 2024 when Scout announced it would be offering a range-extended electric SUV and pickup truck, the Traveler and the Terra.
The two vehicles, but especially the pickup, are expected to shake up the segment for a few reasons. These trucks may be electric, but they have stuff like a body-on-frame construction with a solid rear axle, plus truck-focused interior niceties you could usually only dream up in a modern pickup, like a bench seat and a column shifter.
Most importantly, the first Scouts planned for delivery will reportedly come with the brand’s cleverly named “Harvester” range extender, a naturally aspirated four-cylinder gas motor mounted under the bed that can stretch total range to 500 miles, and eliminate range anxiety. On paper, it’s the perfect truck, able to deliver the range, payload capacity, and towing capabilities of a gas truck and the instant torque of an all-electric pickup, all in a stylish package that doesn’t need a charging station every 300 miles.
With Volkswagen sales in North America floundering, Scout was seen as the brand’s biggest hope for a U.S. revival. Its pitch seemed genius: Offer a superior product compared to legacy brands, using a name Americans are already familiar with. For a few years now, VW has been saying Scout’s two new revolutionary vehicles would arrive in 2027. Now, according to one report out of Germany, the brand’s launch has been pushed back an entire year, to 2028.
The reason? Well, according to the German-language site Der Spiegel, the huge spending needed to complete and operate Scout’s factory in Blythewood, South Carolina might be needed elsewhere within the company to keep things afloat:
The Scout factory is now becoming a political issue in Wolfsburg, especially since the plant and its supplier park are expected to cost three billion dollars (2.53 billion euros) – money that is urgently needed elsewhere. Construction is already well underway, but the factory will likely not generate revenue until a year later than hoped, assuming everything goes according to plan from now on.
The news comes just one day after a report from another German site, Manager Magazin, reported that CEO Oliver Blume had implemented a huge cost-cutting plan that will have VW Group slashing expenditures at a “completely new and unprecedented scale” following the losses from its failed electric vehicle overhaul.
My colleague Matt covered the story yesterday, but basically, VW is planning to find 20% worth of savings … somewhere. Is it a coincidence that the very next day, we’re hearing about the company delaying the launch of Scout Motors, possibly to reallocate funds? Maybe. But it makes sense that the two could be connected in some capacity.
Der Spiegel cites another reason, though: Software. It’s an issue that VW has been plagued with for years now, specifically when it comes to its EVs. And it continues to bite:
The reason for the impending delay: In addition to the development of the hybrid drive with a so-called range extender (REEV), the software is also taking longer than usual, as is so often the case within the Volkswagen Group. Because the software alliance with the US start-up Rivian has not yet delivered what Scout needs, Volkswagen’s own, itself crisis-ridden, development unit Cariad has to step in.
The situation is extremely difficult for the company, as many hundreds of people are already working for the new brand.
Actually, it’s over a thousand people, according to a statement sent by Scout to The Autopian. In an email to me, a representative stressed that the brand hasn’t made any truly official announcements on timelines for delivery, and that it’s forging ahead on building the brand essentially from the ground up. Here’s the full statement:
Scout Motors has not shared any timing or product update announcements.
As you know, Scout Motors is building on multiple fronts – we’re building a factory, we’re developing vehicles, and we’re building a company. We’re making great progress on all of those fronts.
As a company, we’ve hired more than 1,300 employees to date. Consumer and market reaction to our Scout brand and concept vehicles has been overwhelmingly positive. We’re now fully into the heart of the construction process for our Scout Motors Production Center in Blythewood, South Carolina, which remains on track. Our buildings are weathertight and we’ve begun installing process equipment, including the first robot which arrived in mid-January in the Body Shop, marking another major milestone. Additionally, we’ve begun hiring and training our first Maintenance Technicians who will work in the factory. We’re proud of the progress happening on the ground in South Carolina and across our company as we work to bring our factory and vehicles to life.
When they were revealed in 2024, Scout’s vehicles were incredibly compelling, to the point where my colleague David actually put in a pre-order for one. But as he opined almost exactly a year ago, it’s becoming less and less clear whether the brand can keep that momentum going until 2027, much less 2028. By the time the Terra comes out, Ford’s new range-extended F-150 EV will have already been out for a year, killing any hope of the newcomer breaking into the segment early. Ford’s entry also promises more total range (700 miles versus 500 for the Terra with the Harvester engine) and has the backing of a legacy automaker behind it.
I’m still excited for Scout to start selling cars because I love rooting for the underdog. But I’m a tiny bit less hopeful than I was before.
Top graphic image: Scout Motors
VW shoots self in dick (again).
I wasn’t really paying attention to the headlight design and thought the thumbnail for the article was about Rivian.
Scout is becoming VW’s Saturn moment.
The new brand is their introduction to the full-size truck segment that would draw no buyers with a VW logo on it.
Contesting the brand’s funding to distribute it elsewhere within the parent corporation is what starved Saturn to the point of becoming another rebadge dumping ground for GM.
To salvage all the work they’ve done, they could further their partnership with Rivian and make the Scouts become replacements for the R1S and R1T.
If BYD was offering this they’d be on their 2nd generation by now.
I learned to drive manual in a first generation Scout. I love the design, particularly the front end and keeping the original Scout lettering. EV or hybrid makes no difference as at this price point it is just another incredibly expensive toy.
Same love the styling and hope they get made but as I want to replace my FJ and and Polestar 2 in the future but for the price these will be (just like Rivians) I wouldn’t be able to justify the brand new price. That is why I got the 2 for used because they are so damn cheap compared to new but used Rivian prices are still not where I would like so I have doubts used scouts would even come down that much.
At this point though with how bad VW is doing I do wonder if these will ever see the light of day. I may or may not work for a VW owned company and layoffs have already started in January and rumor mill is more are planned by the beginning of next quarter.
How this new design invokes the first and second series of Scouts is a lesson to Jeep as to what they did wrong with the Wagoneer design.
*barfs a little in mouth* yuck the new wagoneers haha
Volkswagen incompetence strikes again.
I can’t wait for them to price these at $100k+.
This delay has got to be great news for Rivian and their R2 though. Yes, BEV vs RE, but gotta be some big overlap between the customers.
Yeah anyone who doesn’t see that coming (David Tracy) is high on the copium.
Let’s do some quick maths, startjng with the ID buzz. Another upscale, retro styled, large electrified vehicle with VW, with a similar size battery to the Scout EREV.
ID Buzz starts at $60,000 US. For a minivan.
Now, let’s make it even larger.
Let’s beef up the chassis, suspension and wheel package to make it a rugged 4×4.
Let’s keep the ID Buzz battery.
Let’s throw in a whole seperate ICE engine and generator paraphernalia
Now let’s build it under a startup subsidiary with its own 3 Billion factory, executive staff, R&D and marketing overhead.
I’m putting this at 70-80k minimum for an absolutely bottom trim Scout with harvester- Which we all know they will build exactly 2 of, and then will never be seen again.
Real talk, every Scout (if they even make it) will be some sort of Terra del Fuego Insigna Harvester Founders (Autumn Sierra Copper Accents) Dedication Golden Hour First (I) Edition (TM)
All that for $120,000! And it can only tow 5000lb. (Not joking, look it up.)
It is the hummer EV 2.0 essentially. Really cool off-road stuff but it is unobtainium for the most of us. Even the R1S starts at 75k which is way to much.
I think the R1S is priced perfectly appropriately. It’s surprisingly competitive to anything I could generously stretch and maybe consider its competition:
It seems to be priced really well considering the whole package. It’s appropriately more expensive than others that don’t have similar capability, features, or level of luxury; it’s cheaper than others that are more luxury or features. Am I missing anything else that is really offering more, or even the same, for less money or is just a better value?
No, the real question is why people seem to assume (from what I can see) is that Scout would leave money on the table and not be priced around the average of around $80-85k of your list. I think some people think the version with “bench seat and column shifter” will cost entry level 1985 Ford F150 XL money, when Scout will probably price both of those as part of a “nostalgia” extra cost option package.
Oh I am not saying it isn’t priced with the competition its just that for me if cost way to damn much I could not see someone 70k+ hell I couldn’t see spending 40k+ on something I would want to off road in and be concerned about dinks, dents, scratches and so on. Now if I was Johnny war bucks or making like 3 or 4 times my pay then hell I wouldn’t mind beating a Rivian or a Hummer EV to hell off road haha.
ALL of those vehicles are overpriced.
At least for average (even above average) consumers. The number of “early adopters” who are willing to spend anywhere near that much money on an EV is very limited, and yet that market segment is just getting more and more bloated. When you factor in the price of batteries they might not be badly priced from a manufacturing standpoint, but since when have consumers cared how much something costs to make versus what its sticker price is?
The day of reckoning is happening and there are going to be a lot of companies and consumers burnt by these prices.
You’re confusing expensive with over priced.
VW at this moment is feels similar to General Electric about the time they started selling off parts of the company: the appliance division, light bulb division, Universal/NBC, aircraft leasing division, etc. VW must cut 20%? I can’t think of another way to do that. Maybe Scout is quietly for sale?
The Chinese would buy up anything VW was willing to sell. Just like with Volvo, it would give them a foothold in markets that right now they are not competing in.
As many other people have mentioned, the Scout is not even remotely revolutionary. I know that this site has a bit of an anti-EV bias, but this has to be one of the worst takes on a new vehicle I’ve seen.
Maybe the Scout wouldn’t be delayed so much if they weren’t fitting a stupid range extender for people like Brian who think that somehow, they need to regularly drive more than 300 miles without stopping.
With an average speed of 60mph, 300 miles is 5 hours of driving. No one needs to go further than that without taking a break, full stop.
Moreover, the Scout is going to be an expensive, luxury car. The market is flooded with expensive, luxury cars that most people can’t afford.
The real revolutionary truck is the Slate. It’s affordable, designed to be easily repaired by owners, and has enough range for 95% of people’s needs without kowtowing to the “BUT SOMETIMES I NEED TO DRIVE 500 MILES WITHOUT STOPPING!” crowd that just wants to hate on EVs because new technology is scary or some bs.
Before anyone chimes in with an argument about towing, believe me, I know EVs are not the best at towing long distances, and a range-extender could help with that. But let’s be honest – the people regularly towing huge boats/trailers hundreds of miles are not representative of the needs of most drivers. Anyone who genuinely needs that capability is probably going to be better off getting a more traditional ICE/hybrid vehicle of some kind. For people who occasionally tow shorter distances, there are lots of EVs currently on the market that can handle those duties just fine.
What a garbage article, honestly. I could not care less if the Scout ever sees the light of day. There are so many soon to be released, actually revolutionary vehicles that aren’t vaporware, like the BMW iX3, the aforementioned Slate, the Rivian R2, the Volvo EV60, etc.
Dude. Road trips. And going on your judgey-mcjudgeypants tone, you live in a city or suburb where you travel about 2 minutes to your job.
Some of us, with normal vehicles, travel and hour + to our jobs. Hell, I used to travel 2 hrs one way to work. And when its cold, that range and charge speed drop really really quick.
EVs are the future, but battery tech and charging are trash for rural folks.
It will change, but its going to take a break-through in tech that’s not here.
This is why, for a lot of folks EVs are garbage.
My friend has a 200 mile round trip to work. She has owned a Tesla Model 3 since 2019. It now has 240,000 miles on the original battery. She has saved an incredible amount of money compared to an ICE car with her long commute by driving an EV and charging at home. Her car has more than enough range to complete that round-trip on one charge.
I have taken several road trips with my Ioniq 5. It charges so quickly that it has not added even on additional minute to the road trip. By the time I’m done using the bathroom and getting a snack, it is done charging.
I have never been impacted by the drop in range in the winter. My I5 still has a lot of range, even when it’s cold.
If you haven’t owned an EV, maybe don’t make assumptions about limitations that don’t exist in 2026 anymore.
“I have taken several road trips with my Ioniq 5. It charges so quickly that it has not added even on additional minute to the road trip. By the time I’m done using the bathroom and getting a snack, it is done charging.”
Gonna call BS there buddy. It takes about 3 minutes to fill a gas tank. When travelling to the in-laws with little kids, trust me, every minute counts 😀
And while I may not OWN an EV, work at a place that has chargers available for employees for free. These are THEIR complaints not my own.
If it works for you great, I’m happy for you. Just dont expect the rest of us to follow along like a good little zombie.
You are clearly anti-EV and are just reading what you want instead of what I wrote. I never claimed that my EV charges as quickly as filling up a tank. I claimed that, in the time I spend using the restroom and getting a snack, time that an ICE vehicle would just be sitting, my vehicle finishes charging, therefore adding no additional time to the trip.
I’m not going to argue with you further. I realize that EVs are absolutely not the right fit for everyone. However none of the points you raised are nearly as valid or egregious as you think they are.
Having traveled vast distances with multiple little kids to get to the in-laws we used to cannonball it too, arriving frazzled and usually needing at least one “recovery” day.
Then we decided to break it up more and when refueling looked for places to actually take a break. Kids could run around with the dog, explore, do whatever to release energy. Spending 30-45 minutes each time at a couple of stops resulted in less fidgety kids, much more kid sleep time in the car, and a very much more relaxed driving experience that made the resulting stay all the better without any dread of the return trip.
Also, there’s no way you’re refueling the car, getting little kids (and yourself) to the gas station bathroom and back while making sure they don’t touch ANYthing, and restocking their munchies or whatever else they need in “3 minutes” on a roadtrip.
I don’t tend to argue this with people, but basically every EV owner I know appreciates how much more relaxing long road trips are when you need to take an extra few minutes to walk around, get food, use the restroom, etc.
I was never one to try to do gigantic road trips with as little time stopped as possible, so for me, EVs don’t really increase travel time. I just can’t sit in a car for 3-5 hours and then take a 2 minute break before heading out again. Some people can, so I can see how an extra few minutes at charging stops might seem like a big deal until they experience it.
I still often cannonball it when solo traveling, but have accepted that every additional passenger in a car for a 900-1000 mile trip seems to add 1 hour to the overall transit time even when pushing. If it’s 13 hours solo then it’s 14 hours with one passenger and 16 hours with three passengers, thankfully then usually involving driver changes. But yes, the breaks ARE absolutely rejuvenating and pay off overall.
Hats off to you; I could never do that!
To be honest, I can’t imagine ever doing a 13-hour road trip anyway, unless maybe I was moving across the country. If I have to go that far, I fly!
See, that’s the other counter to the “we drive across the country every month to see the in-laws” argument, no you don’t, any rational person would fly.
Mine involves a kid in college and involves bringing their car back in the summers and then returning it, sometimes I fly one way, sometimes they fly and I drive it solo, sometimes I go with stuff to do house repairs/improvements there during the year etc…And if you have a full family, flying with four or five people for that particular distance is an edge case as to being worth it or now sometimes when you CAN do it in one calenday day and flying would really be 7 or so hours once airport time and rental car etc is considered, especially with littles involved.
Applehugger recently said that their stops on road trips take 30 minutes. I asked them to explain that and they didn’t respond.
I agree I have a commute of about 45 miles one way and with my Polestar 2 even in winter I have enough when at 90% to get to and from work and back to work so near 150 miles and still have ~20% left luckily I can currently charge at work for free (though that is changing this year I heard and they are putting in chargers we have to pay for lame) but that is besides the point I have not run into a situation where I feel like I needed more then 200 miles for my commute.
Now when we took it down to Florida in December I do wish it had a bit more range (like a lucid) where it could get near 300 miles on a charge when averaging 70-75mph. Though it wasn’t terrible as I could use super chargers and they are everywhere when heading from Chicagoland to Florida but more range would have saved me an extra stop or two of charging would have been nice.
Thank you for including your real-world experience! The Polestar 2 is not a great road-trip vehicle as none of the versions have very good range and they all charge somewhat slowly, but even that is more than sufficient for someone like you with a fairly long commute.
I do think the P2 is a really cool vehicle btw. They look so good!
I’m in the “no free charging at work camp”. IMHO, it sends a bad message to those that haven’t switched to EVs yet. But, I am very for letting employees charge at cost since commercial electric rates are much lower than residential rates.
How does it send a “bad message”? I think it’s good to incentivize employees to drive cars that are better for our climate.
Eventually, when EVs become the norm, it may not be possible for large corporations to all every to charge for free, and I get that. However right now, companies should be leading the push for EV adoption.
On an unrelated note, it is such BS that commercial electric rates are lower than residential rates. That is double true for data centers!
I am running into that issue in NWI we are getting screwed on our electric they increased our rate almost 25% last year alone. All because of the breaks data centers are getting in Indiana.
It’s disgusting. My rates went up by about 10% as well, all due to increased usage by data centers whose electricity charges aren’t even covering the cost of distribution.
The message is favoritism towards EV drivers and giving them a benefit that ICE driver’s can’t get.
…but they should be shown favoritism for driving an EV? I don’t get it. Companies already have electricity. Allowing EVs to use it to charge is trivial. They can’t exactly install a underground petrol tank and pumping station and give away gasoline.
Like, I pay a lower rate for health insurance because I don’t smoke. Is that favoritism or just good logic because I’m less risky to insure?
Ehh I work for an automotive company owned by VW so offering free charging you would think makes sense because of their big EV push. One of my previous jobs offered something like 8 dollars a month to be able to charge 4hrs a day which also is not bad.
But rumor mill here is that they will charge standard rates which makes charging at work pointless because it will cost 25 cent+ a kw/hr which is more then I pay at home. So they are going to waste money pulling out the free chargers to add in ones with CC readers and people won’t use them because it cost to much. No wonder why this company isnt doing great.
Good grief. Corporate malfeasance at its best.
More people may use them than you think though. Obviously anyone who can charge at home won’t, but for people who can’t charge at home, that’s still much cheaper than any DC fast charger.
Your employer will wonder why no one is using the chargers anymore! If anyone does use the chargers, the credit card fees may kill any potential profit from the energy sold.
It sounds like your last employer had it correct with $8/month. I would love to have that deal at my work. That would bring my cost per kwh down to $0.038 for one month of charging. That would cover the commercial electric rate plus have something leftover for the charger cost and payroll processing to deduct it from my check.
Haha well my previous job was using a particle accelerator that uses up to 7 GeV so I am sure the power of charging cars there is like comparing the size of kei car to a air craft carrier. Also that was only one of the accelerators there and that was the biggest one so there were others there plus other divisions there worked with super computers and so on.
Oh my goodness. The extra usage from car charging is probably a rounding error for your previous job!
Since I do own an EV, I can tell you that there are places I want to go in Appalachia that I can’t get to without adding 30% or more distance to to route with chargers, if it’s even possible with the range hit from the bike rack. Barring one of those monstrous 200 KWh GM trucks with a topper to put the bikes in the bed, one of these would be the way for to get rid of my old gas truck and consolidate to one car.
That’s some interesting perspective; thank you!
I didn’t realize a bike rack would reduce range so much.
As cool as those huge battery GM trucks are, they are kind of silly. They are very inefficient and absurdly heavy. They have a use case for some people, just a very limited one!
Yeah, it’s like 25% on 55 MPH roads, way worse at interstate speeds, even with hitch mounted rack. The bikes peek out of the wind shadow on either side.
Oh my goodness. Some company needs to engineer an aerodynamic bike rack. That’s pretty insane!
An aerodynamic bike.
I’m not in full agreement with OP, but you’ve got to realize yourself that your commute (current and most definitely old) are extreme outliers, right?
I think the tone in my initial post was a little more prickly than I intended!
But out of curiosity, what do you not agree with?
I realize a lot of people think that EREVs are a panacea because they combine the range and quick-fueling of ICE vehicles with everything nice about EVs. However, I see them as adding all of the complication and reliability issues of ICE cars to EVs with very little benefit in most cases.
10 years ago, when almost no EVs could even come close to a 300 mile range, EREVs would have been great. Now, there are probably two dozen EVs on the market with near or over 300 miles of range. Some Lucids and GM EVs have near 500 miles of range.
Maybe there are use cases for EREVs that I’m not considering though!
“Maybe there are use cases for EREVs that I’m not considering though!”
Waste heat can keep the cabin (and the battery) as warm as you can stand without hurting range.
I can see why you might consider that idea since, in ICE cars, we have used waste heat from the engine to keep the cabin warm for over a century. However, in an EREV, using the engine to provide cabin heat would be an incredibly wasteful use of energy resources.
Notwithstanding that heat pumps dramatically reduce range loss in cold weather, heating the cabin by burning fuel is incredibly inefficient because much more waste heat is produced than is needed. Electric resistive heating is 100% efficient and heat pumps get over 100% efficiency* except at very cold temperatures.
Additionally, in most cases EREVs won’t use the ICE engine at all, so they will still need to build in alternate heat sources for the majority of the time when the engine isn’t on.
It is possible that EREVs might take advantage of waste heat for cabin conditioning sometimes, but it might not even be worth it when you think of all of the additional coolant loops that need to be added to make that possible.
*Yes I know this is not true from a pure physics perspective, but practically speaking, heat pumps output more energy than they consume!
Waste heat by definition is heat that is normally dumped. Which means the engine isn’t being started for heat, but if that heat is being produced anyway one might as well use it to take some heat pump load off the battery. Heat pumps may be more efficient than resistance heating but they still take power. Waste heat again by definition is just there for the taking so there is no penalty. If your trip is short enough to get by on battery alone, great. If the REX has to kick on to get you where you’re going it can heat the cabin too which takes that much more load off the heat pump system.
“heat pumps output more energy than they consume!”
Only in mild conditions. This argument for REX is more applicable in extremely cold conditions where heat pumps are less efficient.
You are absolutely correct that it theoretically would make sense to scavenge waste heat for cabin conditioning when the engine is running since otherwise, that heat is being wasted!
However, especially depending on where the engine is located, doing so could require a lot of expensive engineering. You’d need another, separate heater core, coolant hoses to run from the engine to the cabin and back, blend doors and logic to dynamically switch between heat sources, etc.
My understanding is that the EREV versions of the Scout will have between 100 and 150 miles of range, which means that very few people will ever use the engine. I knew people who had a Volt with a much smaller electric-only range who would go months without using the engine. It would literally turn on just to keep from sitting idle for too long.
Given how little time the engine is likely to run, it might not make sense to engineer a complicated solution to scavenge waste heat from it. I am not an engineer at Slate, so maybe they came up with some clever way to do it, or decided the extra cost and complexity is worth the benefit. I just don’t think that heating the cabin is a good primary use for the engine in an EREV.
“You’d need another, separate heater core, coolant hoses to run from the engine to the cabin and back, blend doors and logic to dynamically switch between heat sources, etc”
Not necessarily. The heat pump system could be plumbed into the REX and use that as an additional heat source to the outside. Since it’s pulling heat off a liquid (either coolant or oil) such a heat exchanger could be small and still be quite effective.
As to the expense and packaging I such a system might actually help since the coolant would have an extra place to dump heat rather than depending solely on the radiator.
The solution there is to re-examine life choices and if commuting 4 hours a day for work (or even 2) then is that job really worthwhile and/or it’s time to move closer if that job really is that good. If the job doesn’t pay enough to afford to move closer than it’s by definition not good enough for starters. I’ve had both situations and thankfully for myself, my family, and our long-term happiness saw the light in order to make the requisite decisions. As you get older you start to realize that spending 2 (or 4) hours of your waking life in a car every day is not a good use of what time exists.
Driving an hour to work is not an extreme outlier. Have you ever owned a house and then switched jobs?
Yes, multiple times and when it went from a short commute to a long commute once it became apparent the job was good/solid/worthwhile we moved. Moved four times (sold and bought) in a major metropolitan area to various sides of multiple bridges and then moved away for good once it was no longer deemed worthwhile and the ROI on the houses was so good it made sense to get out.
If you own a house and switch jobs that results in a short commute to an hour commute, and you love the job, the pay, and it’s secure, you wouldn’t consider moving and seeing your family for an extra 1.5 or so hours a day or just doing stuff not involving sitting in a car for the rest of your life (or at least the rest of your working career)?
BTW, I mean an hour commute to mean over 50-60 miles of distance, not stuck in traffic for 5 miles at a walking pace that takes an hour. Some people still believe EVs use just as much “fuel” in that case (crawling for 5 miles in an hour as moving 60 miles at 60mph), which is of course not the case at all.
You can consider moving, but it is not always financially possible, and even if it is, it can take a good amount of time to execute on that. My boss just spent 2 years trying to get a home closer to his work
Absolutely true. But now that he’s moved closer he no longer has the extreme case of “range anxiety” that he may have had before that the poster above is using to validate his argument that “EVs are garbage”. They merely don’t work for certain cases, especially if someone isn’t even remotely interested in thinking outside the box.
It’s the rare EV that can’t handle an hour each way commute without stopping to charge (old Leaf maybe?) and it’s not hard to find a modern EV that can handle 2 hours each way without charging. Assuming the above poster owns a home (you wouldn’t RENT and commute 2 hours each way every day, would you?) he can likely charge at home for less than the gasoline or diesel costs to drive that distance.
If moving is not financially possible then maybe that job is not the “rest of your life” good enough job. But driving an hour (or two) each way isn’t good either.
“They merely don’t work for certain cases, especially if someone isn’t even remotely interested in thinking outside the box.”
That is such a great way to put it. Owning an EV often requires very few lifestyle changes to fit even extreme examples. For people with more normal commutes, like me, my travel times are reduced since I have have to stop for gas.
I do think that moving to reduce commute times is not always feasible. I live in an area where a lot of people commute 2-3 hours each way to NYC. Salary is very high in NYC; cost of living in the Poconos is much lower.
There is no amount of money that could convince me to live like that, but some people are just wired differently and genuinely don’t mind that commute because it allows them to afford a lifestyle they otherwise wouldn’t.
You can argue that making less money and having more time is a better way to live (and I would agree), but different people have different priorities.
If I ever was in a situation where I had to endure a commute like that, there is no way I’d ever want to do it in anything other than an EV. The commute is already long and painful enough; I wouldn’t want to make it longer by stopping for gas every 1-2 days!
Less than 10% of workers aged 16 years and older in the United States who did not work from home travel an hour or more.
https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/commuting/guidance/acs-1yr/Percent-60-or-more-minutes.pdf
So maybe it’s not an “extreme outlier” but it is like ~1.3 standard deviations above the mean. Don’t hit back with, “Well it’s not a standard distribution…” It’s a freakin’ comment man, not a statistics paper.
that’s a lot of sass from someone who called it an “extreme outlier” and then backtracked on that statement once they did some actual research
I’m not backtracking; I’m softening my position a bit. But outliers (and thus extreme outliers) are subjective. If I want to call ~1.3 standard deviations an outlier, that’s my prerogative. If you think it’s sassy for a person to move closer to a more mutually found position based on a response, I guess that’s your prerogative (and you may wish to grow some thicker skin).
I guess I could have said something like, “Nah, 1.3 standard deviations is an extreme outlier. I refuse to be swayed! Go lay in the road and count mufflers!”
Are there any EVs on the market that can’t handle a two-hour round trip? I mean that’s like 140 miles maximum. My EV could easily handle that trip twice without recharging, and the Ioniq 5 isn’t some crazy large battery EV with a huge range.
I don’t think this is the argument against EVs that you think it is!
“Some of us, with normal vehicles, travel and hour + to our jobs”
Just so we’re clear there are a lot of diverse situations here, while you might have a “normal” vehicle, you have a highly abnormal commute. The US average is 10-15 miles depending which survey you look at.
And the range drop is ~20% from personal experience (nuzzled up to the Canadian border) and charge speed does not change at all if you know your going to charge and select “precondition” on your way to a charger.
If it doesn’t work for you, that’s fine, but it works for others. Sometimes you have to recognize when you’re a couple standard deviations from typical.
Also people don’t have garages if they live in condos or apartments like I do.
If charging took 5 minutes I wouldn’t care if I had sub 300 range. My bladder doesn’t.
Who made you the arbiter on what people need? And since when do people purchase vehicles (especially new, expensive vehicles like the Scout) based purely on need?
Also, EV charging does still take longer than filling and gas tank. Significantly more importantly, EV charging is NOT ubiquitous like gas stations are. Hence the desire/need for options like EREV.
My company makes components for EV powertrains. I am extremely pro EV. I am also extremely aware that in most places in the middle 80% of the US, EVs are not a slam dunk for most people.
There is no need to get snippy. I never claimed that EVs are the perfect fit for everyone, hence why I admitted that people who tow a lot are probably better suited with an ICE or hybrid. I should also state that people who can’t charge at home in this country will, unfortunately, miss out on a big benefit of owning an EV because we have decided that investing in ubiquitous public Level-2 charging is not feasible (even though it’s commonplace in Europe).
I would encourage you to watch some Aging Wheels videos, as he owns EVs and lives in the middle of nowhere, yet somehow manages to regularly go on road trips and use EVs for normal commuting without issue.
There are absolutely drawbacks to EV ownership, a dearth of fast-charging options in some areas being one of them. However, the majority of issues that Keith mentioned are not as big a deal as most people think.
I know from previous comments that you are vehemently anti-EV, despite what you say, but I’ll try explaining this one more time. If you stop for 15-20 minutes on a road trip, that is time when a normal ICE car would just be sitting doing nothing. An EV can charge during that time. Just because it takes longer to fast charge than fill a petrol tank does not mean that travel time necessarily increases.
Hey, maybe stop telling people what you know about them. You can infer something about someone, but you don’t know anyone on here based on the handful of comments they make.. Telling people who they are is not any way to change peoples minds about EVs, you’re just perpetuating stereotypes. If that’s your goal, you won’t get far around here.
I’ll get snippy all I want when someone is being arrogant and presumptuous. As Max pointed out, the “vehemently anti-EV” statement was bullshit. You should know from previous comments that I am not anti-EV. I am anti-twisting-facts-in-an-effort-to-prove a point. You do it. It’s dishonest.
But you’ve revealed enough about yourself that I don’t really want to engage with you anymore.
It’s not range anxiety, it’s charge anxiety. Yes, I am ready for a break after a few hundred miles of driving, but I don’t want to spend the last 50 miles searching for a charging station (never mind a fast charging station) only to find the chargers are broken of there’s an hour+ wait.
This becomes especially an issue when I prefer the byways to the highways. I live in New England and travel between CT and ME every few months; it’s a great opportunity to explore the backroads and small towns. Even in the boondocks I know I am only 20 or so miles from the next gas station, and the stop is only going to take 5 minutes. That’s something you can’t do in a BEV. At least not until there’s a micro-reactor in every town.
Sure you can and this is where the industry can and should improve overall, it depends on the car you choose though. If you hate Teslas you may not be aware that if you input your destination (via voice or paired with a google map itinerary from your phone) when departing, it will tell you when and where and for how long you need to charge to make it there in the fastest overall elapsed time, it also tells you how much it costs, how many chargers are not working, how many are in use at any given time (in realtime), etc. If you choose to skip one or charge early or longer at another it automatically recalculates, no biggie, no button pushes. And you can tell it to take byways or whatever other parameters you enoy. THIS is where “charge anxiety” goes away and why people in Teslas seem so unreasonably smug when telling you they have no concerns traveling long distances in theirs, because the software in the car is well designed and just works, especially in this particular scenario that most non-tesla users and almost no auto-“journalist” knows about.
Great point. My non-Tesla EV also does all of the charge routing for me. It works great. Basically every decent EV on the market has solved this.
Like, yes there is room for improvement, but that doesn’t mean that the current situation is untenable for road trips. That is just not the case!
Scout’s goal is to sell vehicles, not lecture people about how stupid their buying preferences are. Whether you think Scout’s customers need 500 miles, range anxiety is real. EREVs are where the demand is and it would be idiotic for VW to keep pretending that there is a mass market for another pure EV.
And yet Toyota just showed the pure EV Highlander for 2027 with no gasoline or hybrid option available for it. Overall I will trust Toyota’s insight over VWs. although both have whiffed on EVs in general.
Scout should of course aspire to sell vehicles, however it’s an ever mroe crowded playing field and the overall market seems to be asking for less expensive vehicles rather than more expensive ones.
The Maverick sells, Ford is pinning part of their future on a $30k (or so, we’ll see) EV small pickup, maybe Scout should pivot to something similar rather than another expensive toy in a market segment that, if given 2.5-3 years, Rivian with either make massive strides in or show that it’s folly, either result doesn’t bode well for VW with its Rivian-customer software that they are now trying to supplement with their own faulty stuff that was the reason for approaching Rivian in the first place for help with!
Just about every manufacturer is cancelling pure EV programs and the Scout reservations show where the demand is. I trust that data more than the fact that Toyota is finally making a serious EV (I do not count the BeezKneez or whatever they are calling it).
VW definitely needs to rethink its entire lineup. If it is relying on just Scout to turn things around then that is a problem.
I think you need to qualify that by making it clear that it’s mostly in the U.S. and while EV stuff is being cancelled elsewhere it’s not being given up on at all but rather incorporated in a multi-pronged and longer timeline approach rather than just cancelling everything EV related, period. And then there’s the Chinese that are moving more and more to pure EV and making huge inroads in every country they go into.
There are MANY EVs offered in Europe and elsewhere that will never see the light of day here, and almost all of them would be considered “affordable”, however they are also pretty much all “small” with under 300 miles of range. Just yesterday Toyota announced the Yaris in Europe would be going EV or at least have an EV option. The bg surprise is that the Yaris, yes the small car, is Toyota’s top seller in Europe with volumes of around 400k a year if I read that correctly! The same Yaris that was discontinued here a few years back since nobody wanted to pay under $20k for a Toyota…
The revised BZ is apparently getting good reviews (much better than the original), as is the CH-R. I think the chapter on Toyota EVs is just getting started…And there’ could be a lot of pent-up demand there by people who just trust Toyota over either a “new” brand/manufacturer or vehicles with issues, real or perceived (ID4, the Hyundai name, etc.).
As I posited elsewhere below, I don’t see why VW doesn’t just add a reskinned Scout (kind of how the Touareg, Q7, and Cayenne are/were VERY similar/same under the skin and sell both variants as VWs with almost zero cannibalization taking place. The incremental volume would likely make VW dealers happy(er), fill up some production space, and amortize the development costs over more nameplates.
Fine, but we are talking about what Scout should do, and Scout is specifically being positioned as a US brand for US customers. I don’t think what Europe wants is controlling what VW is going to do for Scout. VW definitely needs to fix its global strategy for its broader lineup.
This may come as a shock, but the USA is one of only many countries in the world!
I travel to India somewhat regularly. If we added one billion people to our population, we would still be in third place behind India and China.
Demand for EVs and EVs going on sale in India are both exploding. Every manufacturer is going full-steam ahead on transitioning to EVs. Many of those aren’t sold in the US due to consumer preference and because we have a small political blip which is artificially and temporarily suppressing demand.
Assuming that “just about every manufacturer is cancelling pure EV programs” because a few EVs in the US exclusively have been cancelled or are no longer being imported here is comically absurd.
Quite the comment thread you got started today LOL, I’ve enjoyed reading it. I don’t have an EV but am by no means anti, I’ll have one at some point. I share your suspicions on EREVs, I don’t quite get it. When the time comes, I’m skipping that step and going full EV.
I guess so! People have very strong feelings about EVs. It’s much easier for me to talk to people in person, because everyone tends to be a bit calmer, and because I can show them my EV and let them drive it.
I literally just made my BIL’s previously very anti-EV father re-think his opposition after about a 20 minute talk and a ride in my Ioniq 5.
I think EREV supporters fall into two camps: people who don’t own EVs and have crippling range anxiety because “BUT SOMETIMES!”, and people like David Tracy who own an EREV that genuinely benefits from the range extender, but only because the electric-only range is very small.
We have moved on from low-range EVs. In this country, there isn’t a single one on sale with well over a 200 mile range.
I’m glad you got some enjoyment out of reading this comment thread!
I’m actually considering a low-range EV, the Slate! A small EV city truck is very compelling to me if they can hit their pricing targets. My commute is four miles round trip and my wife has a newer ICE vehicle to handle the road trips and “BUT SOMETIMES!” moments.
That is so cool! I love how the low-range Slate targeted 150 miles. That is more than enough range for most people, especially as a second vehicle. Having a smaller battery is a great way to cut cost.
Be forewarned though, I also kept an ICE vehicle, which I intended to handle road trips and winter driving. Unfortunately, my Ioniq 5 is so superior for both uses that I basically no longer drive my ICE car (and I really liked it! It’s a 2007 LCI E83 with a manual transmission that I restored and upgraded over the last three years).
This may come as a shock, but Scout is specifically being marketed as an American brand for the American market. I do not think VW cares all that much what the India market wants when planning for Scout production.
I would love to see data on why you think EREVs are where the demand is? Last time I checked, there are basically no EREV options in the US after the cancellation of the Volt.
In more developed markets, EVs are very quickly supplanting traditional ICE/hybrid options without stopping for EREVs along the way. Everyone has figured out that, in most cases, EREVs have more drawbacks than benefits.
I mentioned the data Scout has on its preorders. Scout was initially going to lead with the EV but switched it with the EREV when that is where all the orders were being placed. 85% of the preorders were for the EREV.
One wonders if they’d get more or fewer pre-orders if they just switched to a 6 liter or whatever V8 with a ZF 8speed and abandoned batteries completely.
I was curious so I looked up and found there are 130,000 “reservations” for Scout. Slate apparently has 150,000.
The Lightning had 200K, the Hummer EV 90k. Cybertruck over a million.
That really doesn’t bode all that well in my opinion. Not looking for a response, just stating what I found in a quick and dirty Google search and this seemed the best place to put it.
I think the 130,000 number is outdated. This article from a few weeks ago says Scout has over 150,000 pre-orders. Also, The Drive got a comment from Scout that it is still targeting 2027 production FWIW (that could mean a small possibility of a very small number of vehicles at the end of 2027 for all we know). https://www.kbb.com/car-news/85-of-preorders-for-scouts-new-vehicles-include-a-gas-engine/
Well, mostly because Brian seems to think that needing to travel 500+ miles without stopping is somehow a normal and necessary requirement for vehicles, and because he called the Scout “America’s Most Revolutionary New Pickup Truck,” when it reality it’s 50% vaporware, and even if it does come to fruition, nothing about the truck is truly revolutionary. It’s another expensive EV for high-income earners to take to the grocery store, it just has all of the complication associated with ICE engines, meaning way more routine and non-routine maintenance compared to a BEV.
To be honest, I think that clean diesels making a comeback in vehicles designed for long-range towing wouldn’t be the worst thing.
I am not totally sure where I am off-target, and lots of other people seem to agree with me that this was a pretty bad take!
The SLATE is the revolutionary new pick up truck.
VW/Scout is vaporware bullshit and VW is a dead brand! Big surprise here for anyone without eyes or a brain. This Scout brand isn’t ever going to take off, or even happen.
The VW dealers suing VW over not being able to sell Scouts should appeal in light of this.
It’s hard to argue it’s a separate business if you can take money from it to support your failing business
Yup. Great point.
Some state Automobile Dealer Association (Colorado?) spent a lot of money on the fight against direct sales for these, arguing that it was part of VW and not a “new manufacturer”. Looks like someone wasted a lot of dough.
Our best hope to make more profits in a huge market is this thing, so let’s go ahead and delay that so we can…do something…
This.
I have an EREV Terra reservation. I feel like the writing has been on the wall for a while, and had already assumed I wouldn’t see a chance at a truck until deep into 2028. I also worry what all of that is going to do to the price.
I sold the Subaru and bought a Ranger last week. Maybe I’ll still be interested when the Terra finally happens, if it finally happens. But every time I look it seems further away, not closer.
When I saw revolutionary truck I thought Slate, Scout is just another expensive luxury vehicle.
I thought the same, and am doubtful Scout Motors is one of the “most hyped car brands of the decade.” This thing isn’t even half as “revolutionary” as the Slate if it ever materializes. Price notwithstanding…
Absolutely. I know several non-car people who saw the Slate on Jay Leno or something and think it’s super cool. I barely even remembered that the Scout existed! It’s neither revolutionary nor hyped, unless we’re talking about the dealers hyped to take VW to court over direct-to-customer sales.
Ouch, they could’ve at least mentioned Slate offhand.
I was to retaliate by saying “this is just Rivian if it partnered with VW”. Then I remembered that Rivian already partnered with VW.
So, this is Rivian but with a really old name, Bronco-like retro styling, a range extender, and no Amazon vans.
Of course, best of luck to them, they’re doing hard and presumably good work toward making this thing, but I don’t see what’s revolutionary about it. Even the $30K Ford seems “more revolutionary” (and I say that having developed a firm dislike of its ideas).
Brian, routinely, has the worst takes I’ve ever read. Article after Article. He’s a big brand, big government shill.
I’m going to ignore his politics here, he is still the weakest writer on the site. He just seems to do hot takes, and never dives deeper in news stories like Mercedes does.
I know there’s a lot of pessimistic comments here (for good reason), so let me propose a scenario where this could actually work in Scout/VW’s favor:
Let’s assume that in 2028, there will be a change in administration that will put sensible climate policy back on track, including re-introducing the EV tax credit. Scouts going on sale in 2027 as first planned would be bad, since weak demand would lead to a buildup of unsold units. By waiting until 2028, it would reduce that gap. It would also give VW time to sort out the direct sales/dealership issue.
The current administration will likely be in office for the full year of 2028, with a change in late January of 2029
There’s also no actual guarantee that the regime will actually change (or just change figureheads), but even if there’s a 180 shift to the other party there will be plenty of other priorities on Day 1, if not Year 1.
VW would presumably use that to raise their price pre-intro by $7500 rather than actually offering a benefit, but notably every competitor would also have that so it cancels out at best.
Remember that Tesla introduced the Model Y right when their original tranche of 200,000 EV credits were used up and well before they were renewed without a quantity limit. Pricing was somewhat similar to this and there was no shortage of buyers, Ford was likely licking their chops with the Mach-E figuring they’d have the credit and Tesla wouldn’t, same with VW and the ID4…But as Tesla showed if the product is good/desirable people who have $60k or whatever don’t “need” the tax credit, but the product has to be good/desirable.
The next three years WILL see a lot of EV and maybe EREV development, the rest of the world isn’t moving backwards as we are, if RAM shits the bed on EREV then that’ll turn people off EREVs like GM did with diesels 40 years ago. I wouldn’t really want to be VW counting on RAM doing a great job, and let’s place our bets on how many recalls Ford will be issuing when/if theirs gets out of the gate…
Toyota just announced the new regular Highlander will be pure EV starting next year or so with no ICE or hybrid option at all. All of a sudden the supposed “oh so smart for waiting” EV laggard is firing a completely unexpected shot after relaunching the BZ to good reviews as well as the CH-R. If it succeeds there’ll be other entrants into the space, but notably there’s nothing stopping Toyota from developing an EREV as another sort of Prius-tech variant, yet they are skipping that and thinking EVs might work for them after all in the U.S. and on a mainstream name rather than just an option (although the somewhat larger Grand Highlander will be ICE for now at least) in a fairly saturated segment.
The ONLY thing Scout is trading on is their name and some cool design that looks as similar to Rivian as it does to Scout 1.0, which, frankly besides to gearheads with long memories such as the commenters here, the Scout name doesn’t have very much natural cache with the general buying public as opposed to Jeep and Bronco and the squandered Blazer name. And even the gearheads couldn’t keep IH solvent the first time around, so really there aren’t that many people that interested (IMHO), VW as an owner/engineer doesn’t make me nearly as interested as if for example Honda had bought the Scout name. Would ANY of the people interested in a Scout be anywhere near as interested if the exact same thing had a VW badge on it?
I’m going to ask a follow-up question here based on the last sentence of my above response: Let’s assume Scout actually makes it to market. Why wouldn’t VW design a reskinned version of both the SUV and the Pickup and let VW dealers sell them as VWs? Different body panels and interiors but mechanically the same. A) that might shut VW dealers up to some extent in regard to not selling the Scout brand and B) Give VW some sorely needed product in two spaces they currently have nothing in (Traveler is almost a foot longer than Atlas and why wouldn’t they want a pickup) and C) another outlet to fill up production capacity and no tariff issues.
Then again, another way for VW to save a lot of money is to just finish the factory, finish the engineering and literally just build and sell them as VWs in an already established network rather than actually launching and marketing a whole new brand with all of the duplication that entails from a management personnel perspective along with everything else. Scout intenders may not want to buy a VW but perhaps there are people that would buy a VW large SUV and Pickup that wouldn’t buy a Scout for whatever reason.
“…frankly besides to gearheads with long memories such as the commenters here, the Scout name doesn’t have very much natural cache with the general buying public as opposed to Jeep and Bronco and the squandered Blazer name.”
YES! No one who isn’t a huge car nerd remembers the Scout brand. I am 36 years old and Scout went out of business almost a decade before I was born!
This brand name has no cachet with the general buying public.
If Bezos gets Slate up and running any time soon and the product is even halfway decent in real life, I think that could poach just enough sales from Scout’s lower end that they wouldn’t ever hit any targets they need to for profitability. I see them becoming just like any one of the Fiskers that have withered on the vine.
I don’t see a ~$30k truck with short range being any competition for this. FWIW I think they’ll both be DoA.
I agree that the Slate and the Scout aren’t even close to targeting the same buyer base, but I don’t think either will fail if they truly deliver on their promises (Slate is also coming out this year, allegedly, so we’ll see)
Bezos is still, to my knowledge, not directly involved with Slate. Pretty sure it’s so often described as “Bezos-backed” because a billionaire fight with Musk was a good story.
“Slate” is amusingly an anagram of “Tesla” as well.
I agree. Although the Slate doesn’t compete in the same price segment as the Scout, I strongly suspect there will be more buyers cross-shopping the two than it seems. Just because someone can afford a more expensive, luxury vehicle doesn’t mean they will automatically choose that option.
The Slate is genuinely cool and I could see a lot of higher-income people buying one as a second or third vehicle because it has a cool image.
Scout 2.0 is going to end up like Scout 1.0. A lack of money to do it right and eventually the big dirt nap.
Even if they do keep it going, VW has so many issues and so many different things pulling on its wallet that Scout’s going to end up underfunded. And then Scout dealers/service centers will end up like VW dealers in the 2000s – besieged with quality issues, problems with warranty claims and annoyed buyers, and a long slide from beloved icon into mass market malaise with better options for most buyers.
The country doesn’t need another higher-end “brand”. The current brands (both mass market and luxury) have or by 2028 will have that part of the market well covered. Refocus to something like the original Scout and develop a cheap, Slate/Maverick type of thing that will get people talking like they did when the “New Beetle” debuted. Or better yet, VW, just get your house in order over the next half-decade and then check the bank account to see what you can really afford. Just like your buyers.
David has got to be devastated.
Since when it comes to the US market VW couldn’t manage to organize an orgy in a whorehouse successfully, I am not holding my breath for Scout to do much of anything other than lose huge amounts of money.
Yes, VW’s new idea would be to charge the ladies and let the men in for free. NeinVergnügen.
ROFL! Probably spot on.
Who could have ever seen this coming?
I am shocked by this.
Shocked I say..
Also saw that scout was moving a lot more engineering from MI to the SC location
I can see a scenario where Scout folds during the impending post-AI bubble-burst recession and then VAG uses the US plant to avoid tariffs.
Audi Q5, Porsche Macan, and perhaps the to-be-announced entry-level Bentley Butler or something similar…
I’m getting a bit of Cybertruck Déjà vu. Not saying it would have been a smashing success, but had the Cybertruck actually hit the market when initially promised I bet it would have noticeably better, for a couple of reasons.
But hey at least Scout’s parent company’s fascist connections are already long in the past so unlikely to have an effect on their sales when they do finally hit the market, so they’ve got that over the Cybertruck.
I think it’ll be more of a Hummer EV in the end in terms of hype and impact, though that launched in probably the optimum window (chip shortage conditions)
At least Scout didn’t promise some outlandishly low price point it could never end up reaching
Scout hasn’t as of yet managed to meet its price point by releasing anything and is now moving the release date back by at least a year becasue they can’t even afford to engineer the thing with the resources they currently employ. That does not bode well for releasing it at any previously published price point. Another year of delay adds costs, it doesn’t reduce them. If it ever makes it to market it is extremely unlikely to be at whatever price was initially proposed, the real question is now much extra a vehicle that looks and is equipped like the “teaser” vehicles that got people including David to put down a deposit actualy will cost compared to whatever the initial “starting at” price point that was bandied about as well as how much more that base price is.
VW’s really doing their best to improve American car manufacturers’ competitiveness relative to the European manufacturers.
GM and Ford should send them an edible arrangement or something.
Not beating or at least matching Ford’s entry to the EREV truck market could be disastrous, then they’d only have branding and product to compete on. At least Rivian will be somewhat out of the picture since they’ve moved on to the R2 and R3 products.
Another factor that helps the decision is that delaying the plant’s opening (and thus, any use of the plant by other VAG brands) may help them in the Scout vs dealerships court case.
These are a super cool idea but they’re basically vaporware at this point and if they’re not coming for another 2 years at this point they might miss their window. When they were announced there was nothing like them, but Ford and RAM could have EREV trucks to market before them at this point…and the Rivian R2 is launching this spring.
Rivian has been hush-hush about the final numbers but the initial drive reviews came out last week and it received nearly universal praise. The Jeep EV thing is about to hit the market and while they probably won’t be cross shopped by TOO many people the BEES woodland and Subaru equivalent are about to hit dealers.
I just don’t think Scout can keep the momentum up any longer. They had already taken way too fucking long BEFORE this delay. Their early mover advantage is gone and two years from now who even knows if the off road craze is still going to be going strong. And honestly it’s a bummer, because Scout seemed to have a really neat product.
Agreed. It’s like the super long roll out of the new Supra. It was teased for so long that people stopped caring. The Scout was really compelling, but it’s off everyone’s radar. I have a deposit on a Scout, but I’ll just buy the F150 EREV instead if it is a year sooner.
While they’ll definitely be competing with the RAM and Ford EREV trucks, delaying by a year puts Scout’s most direct competitor, the Rivian R1 a bit farther out of the picture (Rivian will likely completely abandon the expensive R1 ASAP much like Tesla with S & X). At the ~$60k+ estimated starting price, I don’t think Scout intends to compete with Toyotas and Subarus, and it’ll likely have the new overpriced Jeep EV beat on specs & product.
I think the bigger problem is that the market at such a price point may be too small especially after the incoming post-AI bubble recession that’ll surely hit before 2028. I think they really have to hope that the luxury car brands don’t bring good big-battery-PHEVs or EREVs to their lineups so they can steal away buyers for their unique EREV SUV product.
Reminds me of the Buzz. If they ever do roll this out, it will be so late everyone has lost interest, and the price will be laughably high.